A full draft of chapter 5 is now available to download.

It argues that existentialism is a development of Freudian psychoanalysis, designed to preserve Freud’s insights into behaviour by providing a more explanatory theory of the structure of motivation.

More specifically, it argues that Sartre’s critique of Freud and development of his own theory of mind constitutes an important break with the Cartesian dualism that shapes Freud’s theory of mind, but Sartre retains a part of this Cartesian heritage that Beauvoir’s theory then eliminates.

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Draft chapters are available from the Book page.

A full draft of chapter 4 is now available to download.

It argues that Beauvoir’s 1943 novel She Came To Stay presents her distinctive form of existentialism through a critique of Sartre’s theory of freedom.

Her view is that freedom requires a sedimentation of projects and the values they embody. Without this, there cannot be the commitment required for freedom.

Sartre’s theory of freedom excludes the possibility of this sedimentation. Beauvoir dramatises this disagreement in the relationship between Françoise and Pierre.

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Draft chapters are available from the Book page.

A full draft of chapter 3 is now available to download.

It argues that Merleau-Ponty’s critique of Sartre’s theory of freedom fails. Merleau-Ponty has succeeded in showing that one of Sartre’s claims about freedom is untenable, but has not shown that this requires the rejection of the entire theory rather than just of that one claim.

In arguing for this, the chapter clarifies Sartre’s theory of freedom in Being and Nothingness and argues that Beauvoir’s defence of Sartre’s theory a decade later indicates that Sartre’s theory had developed over that time.

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Draft chapters are available from the Book page.

wikimedia image of Albert Camus in 1957

A full draft of chapter 2 of the book is now available to download.

It argues for a new interpretation of The Outsider, which shows Camus to have been opposed to the foundational claim of existentialism even before Beauvoir and Sartre had published it and before he had met them.

It also argues that this disagreement explains their later public row about the role of political violence.

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Draft chapters are available from the Book page.